


Replaced

by coley_wog



Series: Redacted [1]
Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Angst, Angst with a Happy Ending, Gen, Justice For Kuron, Kuron deserved better, Kuron is Shiro (Voltron)'s Clone, Sort Of, because i need to point out how messed up this was, thought about giving this a sad ending but i didn't have the heart
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-17
Updated: 2018-10-17
Packaged: 2019-08-03 13:21:37
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,789
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16327052
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/coley_wog/pseuds/coley_wog
Summary: Someone took control of his body once. He won't let it happen again.Set during season 7 episode 1.





	Replaced

Blackness stretched out all around him. What happened? Where was he? He couldn’t move, couldn’t speak, though his thoughts echoed deafeningly in the darkness. 

“This is a dream,” Shiro realized as he tried to quell his rising panic, “I’ll wake up soon.” He knew he was on the edge of it, that lucid moment where dreams melt away and reality starts to sink in. But no matter what he tried, he lacked the strength to open his eyes. He was so tired, so weak. Not even the growing pain in his right shoulder or the quiet murmuring could break him from this limbo. 

Wait. Murmuring? He strained to listen and sure enough, he could hear voices, distant, distorted, but voices he knew and loved. Every now and then, he caught a word. 

_“... consciousness...”_

“Allura?”

_“... gotta be something...”_

“Keith? Keith, where are--?”

Then he felt it, something encroaching, enveloping his mind, settling into his limbs, reaching for his thoughts. Memories flashed before him: the screaming pain as the witch sank her claws into his skull, her voice shattering all thought, crippling his will, the looks of fear and betrayal and pain on his friends’ faces, the virus, Keith beneath him with a blade against his face, then pain pain pain... then nothing. 

“NO!” Like a wounded animal he lashed out against the intruder. “Get out! Get OUT! Keith! Allura! Are you there? Are you safe? Are the others with you?” They had to be. He could hear their distant voices, though not their words. “Pidge! Lance, Hunk, Coran!” The thing had receded, but he could still feel it, poking and prodding at the edges of his mind, looking for a weak point. “She’s come back for me! I don’t know how long I can keep her out. You have to do something! Stop her! Get away from me! Don’t let me hurt you again! Somebody! Please! Can you hear me?” The voices continued as if he’d never spoken. They couldn’t hear him. He was on his own. 

But they were safe. They were alive. He wanted to cry from the relief of it, but he forced himself to focus on the immediate threat. He couldn’t stop her before, but he had to try. Only then could he reunite with his team, tell them how sorry he was for hurting them, for letting them be hurt. Maybe in time, he could earn their forgiveness. Even if he didn’t deserve it--like he hadn’t deserved it from Lance--they were a team, a family. They’d brought him back, hadn’t they? Despite all he’d done? They’d forgive him long before he could forgive himself. 

_“...going to be ok...”_  Allura’s voice gave him hope as the entity pushed against his mental walls. He pushed it back. Strange. It didn’t feel at all like before. The intrusion, while assertive, was nowhere near as overpowering. He couldn’t hear Haggar’s voice, and gone was the ear-splitting headache. But it was still here to take control of his body and mind. That hadn’t changed. 

Perhaps she no longer held power over him. Keith... Keith severed the arm. Maybe without it, she couldn’t gain control so easily. He had a chance, even in his weakened state. Keith had saved him--had given him that chance. 

Again and again she tried to break through, and each time Shiro pushed her back. Every attack was weaker than the one before it, but his defenses fell apart faster than he could rebuild them. 

_“Fight...”_  

“Keith...” His heart swelled. They knew. Keith knew. They were there for him. “I’m fighting, Keith. I won’t fail you this time.” His resolve strengthened as the attacks grew more frequent, more desperate. 

Despite his best efforts, something broke through. A limb reached past his barrier to grasp at his mind, and a stream of memories spilled forth from the cracks. 

_Trapped in a plane of darkness, silent stars hanging above and reflected below, fear for his friends, his family, pride in them, then fear and anger. “How could they not know? How could they replace me so easily? After all we’ve been through! How could they trust him? He’s dangerous. He’s going to hurt you. I’m still here. I’m here! I’m right here!”_

Shiro recoiled as if he’d been burned. The voice had been his, but the memories were not. The limb--a hand--not withered and clawed, but glowing and human and so very like his own--tore at the crumbling wall. In bewilderment and fear, he forced it back, more of its thoughts trickling into him through the contact. 

_“The thing that attacked you wasn’t me”_

He shut the hole back up as best he could, but its light still shone through the cracks, cold fear creeping into his heart. 

_“...clone body is rejecting Shiro’s consciousness...”_  

“No...” His eyes widened as fear gave way to realization. The facility, the tubes filled with copies of himself... no, not of himself, of  _him._  He stumbled back from his walls and the glow behind it. 

_“...some way you can help!”_

He should have known. The clues were all there. The headaches, the messed up memories, how everything always felt just a little off, all that time he didn’t feel like himself... because he wasn’t.

_“...nothing I can do...”_

How could he have been so stupid? To think they’d forgive him after what he’d done. Shiro--no, not Shiro--curled in on himself. 

_“Shiro, please! Fight!”_

He resisted the urge to stand back up. Those words weren’t for him. None of them were.  _“As many times as it takes.” “I'm not leaving here without you.” “I love you.”_  They were meant for Shiro, not him. His heart cracked in two. Keith wanted  _Shiro_  to fight, to win, to take his body and his life. The walls around him shook and crumbled. He let them.

_“You can’t do this to me again.”_

The intruder shattered through his barrier, and Shi--the clone finally saw him for what he was: Shiro--the real Shiro--gold and glowing in the darkness of his mind, someone who had never done what he did, who had never hurt his family the way he had. His dark and weary eyes fixed on the clone in wrath and judgement. The clone knew he had every right to look at him that way, but it didn’t mean he had to like it. 

The clone stood and met Shiro’s gaze with a glare of his own. He was angry at Haggar for creating him and turning him on his friends, at himself for not being able to prevent it, at his friends for giving up on him as if he were nothing (even if he was nothing); but most of all, he was angry that the right thing to do now was to just roll over and give up without a fight. Clone or not, that was never something he was good at. 

Shiro still hadn’t moved from the edge of his consciousness. His eyes had turned from anger to cold assessment, as if the clone were some kind of lab rat to be analyzed. It only added to the clone’s indignation. “What are you waiting for?” He shouted. It was all he could do to keep his voice from breaking. He didn’t want to die, but showing weakness to his other self felt far worse. 

Then Shiro’s eyes softened into something unforgivable: pity. 

* * *

It had taken longer than he’d hoped. His spirit was weak, but the walls keeping him out finally fell, this time with no resistance. When he first awoke in this body, he didn’t expect it’s original owner to still be there, trying to force him out, but he wasn’t too surprised. Nothing was ever easy. 

Still, he broke through, and at last stood before the thing that had taken over his life, fooled his team--his friends, and hurt them. How could no one suspect? Even Keith? How could he be so easily replaced? Even Black had let it pilot her, despite his protests. He told himself it had been out of necessity, because lives would be lost otherwise. It couldn’t be because an evil impostor was worthy of the Black Paladin mantle. 

Now that he was seeing it, it didn’t look nearly as monstrous and evil as he thought it would--angry, yes, but not evil. But a creation of the Witch to attack and hurt his friends had to be evil.  

“What are you waiting for?” It shouted. 

He saw it trembling through the forced bravado, not just in anger, but in fear, sorrow, despair. There was a look in its eyes like a cornered animal, and something stirred in Shiro’s heart. 

It took a step towards him, eyes incredulous, voice raised, “Don’t... Don’t you  _dare_  look at me that way! I know why you’re here! Why they put you here! They want the real Shiro back and the evil clone gone! Everyone lives happily ever after! I...” It hesitated, running a hand through its hair in frustration, its next words came out strangled and broken, “I hurt them... Remember? You saw Keith’s face? I did that.” It balled its trembling fists. “So you should just... do what you came to do already...” 

Shiro had expected a monster, the Witch’s mindless beast, a villain raving about failed plans, anything but this. He hadn’t expected it--no,  _him_  to look so small, so young, so hurt, so certain he wasn’t wanted, so afraid to hope, hiding behind a mask of anger... 

So very like a young orphan who’d hijacked his car all those years ago. 

“Why are you dragging this out? Don’t you want to see them again?” The clone said, his voice ragged. 

“Don’t you?” Shiro asked gently, taking a step forward.

The clone bristled and took a step back. “What? I’m the bad guy, remember? What I want doesn’t matter. Even if I did, they don’t--” he grit his teeth and looked away. “They want to see  _you_  again,” he muttered bitterly.

“So you’re giving up?” Shiro advanced again. 

“What choice do I have? You’re suggesting I fight back? Kill you? Take this body back for myself, continue living a lie?”

“You think they’d know the difference?” It was Shiro’s turn to be bitter. 

“ _I’d_  know the difference. I... don’t want to die, but...”  He covered his face. “What is there for me to return to?” 

“I don’t know...” Shiro made his way over to his clone and slowly, hesitantly raised a hand to his shaking shoulder, his thoughts and feelings flowing easily into him. 

_How could they replace me so easily? After all we’ve been through... I’m still here. I’m here. I’m right here..._

“...Let’s find out together,” said Shiro. 


End file.
